


The Facts of the Misery

by Howlingdawn



Series: Whumptober 2019 [4]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, F/M, Gen, Heavy Angst, I hate myself for this, Whumptober, Whumptober 2019, but i hurt myself too much to not post it, set in my We Could Not Stay verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-16 09:28:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21034043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Howlingdawn/pseuds/Howlingdawn
Summary: It's T'Lal's job to protect the people she loves. Literally. She's the chief of security - she's made a career of it. When she fails... it's catastrophic.





	The Facts of the Misery

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Whumptober Day 14 - Tear-stained. Tried a bit of a new format with this, I hope it works!

** _Fact #1: The mission was to explore._ **

It was a beautiful day to make first contact with the people of Pheorus. They were a dainty race, the tallest individuals barely scratching four feet, not an ounce of extra fat or muscle to be seen on any of them. Their skin was a soft lilac, their hair a few shades darker, cropped short and curly. Despite their statures, they had the biggest smiles. Their guide, Binav, pointed out everything from simple shops to cultural landmarks with his long, stick-like fingers shaking in excitement, his voice bright with eagerness.

The buildings resembled colorful mushrooms, the paths between them marked by lines of cheerful yellow flowers. Binav had explained that the Pheorans grew them in special ceremonies, using their connection to their planet’s spirit to ask her to shelter them. T’Lal had called it magic. Her sister appreciated the beauty of the term’s imagery, but Amanda would certainly go seeking out a more scientific answer later. David would, at some point, coax her out of her work for a date, a midnight stroll through the woods beneath the planet’s three moons.

All in all, T’Lal felt rather out of place in her red security uniform, phaser holstered at her hip. She was looking forward to later, when Iris would let her coax her away from interrogating the Pheoran cultural leaders to enjoy a date of their own in the fresh air on this beautiful little planet.

** _Fact #2: There wasn’t a later._ **

The explosions caught them by surprise. As T’Lal whipped out her phaser, searching for the source of the balls of fire now raining down upon the village, Binav cried out something about terrorists. “Run!” he cried, waving them towards the center of the village. “Run and hide!”

Realizing the fire was coming from the hills outside the village, a distance her phaser couldn’t cross, T’Lal agreed with him. Her priority now on getting her captain, first officer, and chief xenoanthropologist to safety, she urged them on. David grabbed Amanda’s hand, his other flipping open his communicator. “Kirk to _Enterprise_, beam us out of here, _now_!”

_“Locking on now, Captain!”_

** _Fact #3: It was too late._ **

A massive fireball, far bigger than the others, hurtled towards them.

Amanda’s visor, the miraculous little piece of technology that had granted her the sight she needed to enter Starfleet, shone in its light. It created a wind of its own, toying with David’s meticulously styled platinum blond curls. Even at a distance, T’Lal could feel its heat singing her pale skin. Iris clapped a hand over her mouth and nose as smoke wafted over them, her other hand finding T’Lal’s and holding tight.

All of this, T’Lal saw in slow motion.

Then the fireball hit the ground, tearing it to shreds, the shockwave blasting them forward. Flames and debris and flaming debris hurtled through the air with them. Iris’s hand was torn out of hers, embers singing her skin, shrapnel tearing her uniform. She was grateful they didn’t use stone for their walkways when she hit the ground, rolling over and over and over, clawing at the grass and dirt to stop herself, reaching for her wife and her sister and her soon-to-be brother-in-law.

But they did use boulders for décor. Her head cracked against one, and the world went black.

** _Fact #4: No matter what, it’s my job to protect them. As big sister, wife, chief of security, it’s my job to keep them safe._ **

She didn’t know for sure how long it was before she came to with a gasp, trying to bolt upright. Pain seared through her entire body, and Iris pushed her down with firm, gentle hands. “Stay still, sweetheart,” she said.

Her voice shook. Her eyes, normally full of love and excitement, were dark with pain, full of tears.

T’Lal pushed upright, and Iris couldn’t fight her Vulcan strength. “Amanda?” she called, the word lost in a choked rasp. “David?”

Smoke billowed around them, the fires still dying down. The colorful mushrooms and elegant paths lay in ruins, torn apart, their remnants strewn wildly across the village. Pheorans were stumbling around, terrified, wailing. Beams of white light announced the arrival of _Enterprise _crewmembers, security and doctors and nurses, each one pausing as the stench of burned flesh and the screams of the wounded assaulted their senses after leaving behind the pristine white corridors of the _Enterprise_.

Finally, T’Lal spotted David, his platinum curls a beacon amongst the charred, blackened everything else. He was hunched over something. She tried to get up, tried to get him, fingers groping for a phaser that wasn’t there, but Iris renewed her efforts to hold her in place. “Please, T’Lal, just _stay here_.”

She was trying hard enough that breaking free might hurt her, so T’Lal forced herself to stop and look at her wife. Blood marred her dark skin, streaking along her forehead, her cheeks, her throat. But her cheeks and throat also shone, stained by tears, smearing swathes through the blood and grime. “Please,” Iris whispered.

In one abrupt moment of horror, T’Lal’s mind cleared enough to feel their bond, and Iris’s grief slammed into her like a tsunami.

_No._

** _Fact #5: Amanda is seventy-five percent human. I am seventy-five percent Vulcan. I was always going to outlive her._ **

T’Lal shoved Iris away. “Amanda!” she screamed, trying to stand. Her legs gave out, the world spinning, so she crawled through the sharp and smoldering debris, ignoring how it cut and burned her palms and knees. “Amanda!”

It was the only word she could say. A horrified scream, a desperate prayer, a choked sob. She crawled for an eternity, remembering a lifetime, remembering the first time she’d held her newborn half-sister, the first time she’d heard her laugh, the first time she’d told her about the stars, the first time she’d seen her kiss David, the first time she’d seen her in her uniform, the first time she had shown off her engagement ring.

David was hunched over her, his duties as captain forgotten. He acted only as Amanda’s fiancé, only as her lifelong best friend. He cradled her face, his tears falling onto her cheeks. “Wake up, darling,” he pleaded, his voice a breath. Amanda loved the way he said ‘darling.’ “We still have to get married. It’s only a week away. Everyone will be there.”

Amanda didn’t respond. She always responded. She was bright and cheerful and curious, never quiet, always expressing love or asking questions.

** _Fact #6: But we were supposed to grow old together first._ **

Now she was still. Silent. Her visor had been knocked off, her milky white eyes staring at nothing, her hair fanning out beneath her. Her limbs were sprawled out, the pair of stripes on her wrists denoting the commander rank she had only just earned burned away. A single shard of glass protruded from her side, its tip buried in her heart, her pure, golden heart, all the love it had ever held bleeding out, staining her blue uniform red. Her engagement ring was half buried in ash, dull and dirty on her finger.

“_Amanda_!”

T’Lal’s voice was a shriek. She staggered the last few feet, fumbling futilely for a pulse, checking her wrist, her neck, _anything_. But she was still, silent, cold. She was human. Vibrantly, beautifully human. She wasn’t supposed to be _cold_.

“Amanda?”

Her voice was a hoarse whisper, a sobbed plea. She reached out with a shaking hand, picking up the fallen visor, scrubbing at the ash coating it so nothing would get in her eyes. Gently, oh so gently, she slipped it over Amanda’s eyes. “There,” she whispered, tenderly brushing stray hairs out of the way. “You can wake up now.”

She didn’t stir.

** _Fact #7: She wanted to be a mom. She always talked about how her kids would love their grumpy Aunt T’Lal._ **

“Let me see.”

Joanna. Joanna had come. She was smart. She had served aboard the _Enterprise _for almost as long as Amanda had been alive, learning from the best. She would heal her. She always did. She had the same talent for pulling medical miracles out of thin air that her father did.

Confident in that, T’Lal let Iris pull her back, her wife’s arms wrapping securely around her from behind. But she was still crying. Why was Iris still crying? Joanna always saved them.

All she did was run a tricorder over her body and shake her head, looking up first at David, then T’Lal. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, tears welling in her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

“No,” T’Lal said. “No, you have to save her. Save her!”

“Go,” Iris told Joanna. “I’ve got them.”

** _Fact #8: She almost had that. She almost had everything._ **

Joanna nodded, swallowing before hurrying to other patients, swiping at an escaped tear. David didn’t try to stop her, just picking up Amanda’s hand, pressing a kiss to her knuckles, wiping her ring clean with his thumb. He clenched his eyes shut, his tears sliding down her wrist.

“No,” T’Lal protested, looking wildly from Joanna to David to Iris and back again. “No! Someone- someone has to- she needs- _I need my sister_!”

“I know,” Iris whispered, kissing her cheek. “I know, sweetheart. But- but she’s gone, and I am so sorry.”

T’Lal wanted to fight. She had always fought. It was her job. It was her choice. She fought to protect the people she loved, her family, her crewmates. Always. She had never failed. Never.

Until today.

“No,” she rasped, tearing free of Iris’s hug. “No.” She grabbed fistfuls of Amanda’s dress, done being gentle. “Wake up.” She shook her sister, desperate. “Wake up!”

No one tried to pry her off. But Iris and David both placed restraining hands over hers, gently making her lay Amanda down. “It’s over,” David said, his voice cracking. “She’s gone.”

T’Lal screamed. She gathered her baby sister into her arms, cradling her, holding her close. She fell limp against her, a deadweight in her arms, but T’Lal pretended it was sleep. It had to be sleep. She couldn’t bear anything worse right now.

“I’ve got you,” Iris murmured, rubbing her back. “I’ve got you.”

David stood up and stumbled away, seeking solace in his job, her engagement ring clutched in his hand.

T’Lal just held her sister and cried.

** _Fact #9: I didn’t know it – none of us did – but I didn’t just fail Amanda that day._ **

A week later, on the day Amanda should’ve been getting married, T’Lal sat with her parents, her surviving sister, and the boy who would now never be her brother-in-law, staring at Amanda’s autopsy report. Tears stained even her dad and sister’s cheeks, no amount of Vulcan discipline able to overcome the new grief held in Nyota’s hands.

** _Fact #10: My sister died pregnant._ **

**Author's Note:**

> This is like. Absolutely NOT how Amanda's story actually ends. If anyone's wondering. I just had to go here for Whumptober aND I REGRET IT


End file.
